HAART

Mycroft had long since accepted the insomnia that the medication keeping him alive caused. At times he had even considered it an asset, it had served to convince many subordinates that he really was some sort of political machine, equally capable of handling a crisis at three in the morning as he was at noon.  

He wasn’t worrying about work in the middle of the night anymore. 

Greg snored. At first Mycroft thought that was going to bother him--Peter’s snoring had set his teeth on edge--but he found himself actually enjoying the gentle droning. It drowned out the cacophony of self-critical thoughts that swirled around his head at night when the rest of the world was silent. 

When exhaustion finally overtook him and he did fall asleep, his dreams were pleasant for the first time in years. He didn’t have to spend his nights replaying the day he told Peter that he was taking Michelle and leaving, or catastrophizing about Michelle’s health. His dreams were a continuation of his days now, medleys of Katie’s giggles and Michelle’s sarcastic asides, of Greg’s soft lips against his, tasting of coffee and the cigarettes he swore he was done smoking. Every night Mycroft kicked himself for waiting so long to allow himself the joy of sleeping in the same bed as Greg. 

Greg shifted in his sleep, mumbling some nonsense. Mycroft smiled adoringly, combing his fingers through Greg’s hair until he settled back down. He loved the man lying beside him so much it was difficult to stomach sometimes. His love for Greg was so boundless, so open and trusting that it felt like he was back in university, falling for his handsome young professor all over again. 

The thought of Peter brought him back down to Earth. He had often wished that Peter had been more of a monster. He wanted to be able to look back and identify the moments that should have tipped him off, the red flags he assumed he must have missed. But truly, there were none to find.   

Peter had treated him so kindly at the beginning. Sure, he was a married man pursuing a relationship with his student who was just barely on the right side of legal, but he had been so kind. They had spent hours together, discussing politics and ethics, chatting about Mycroft’s family and Peter’s daughter. Six months of meeting three to four times a week and every time Peter would walk Mycroft to the door of his office, smile warmly at him and ask that he come back soon. Six months to the day from their first meeting Peter walked him to his office door, cupped Mycroft’s cheek in his hand, and kissed him. 

That day had swirled around in his mind for years. Was that the day he was infected? Despite his normally flawless memory, he could never recall if the word condom had come up in the frenzied rush to remove each other’s clothes following that kiss. He knew for a fact that it didn’t come up later that night when Peter brought him back to his marital bed, nor did it come up the next morning while breakfast burned on the stove. 

He had learned later that little Michelle was with her grandparents that night, they had been kind enough to take her a couple of nights a week so Peter could get some real sleep while his wife lay dying in the hospital of a disease he gave her. 

He thought about Michelle’s mother regularly. Victoria. Victoria Elisabeth Monroe.  He would carry shame about the way he acted towards her for the rest of his life. Usurping her place not only in Peter’s life, but then in Michelle’s before she was even cold in her grave. He had ensured that Michelle’s grandparents stayed in her life, but he could hardly face Victoria’s parents. 

“Did you have the decency to wait until her side of the bed cooled before leaping into it?” Her mother had snapped at him the first time he opened the door for them to come collect Michelle. 

“Amelia, that’s not fair,” her father had murmured, but he couldn’t look Mycroft in the eye. It was just as well, Mycroft couldn’t look at him either. 

It wasn’t until after Peter had died and the truth about his diagnosis had come out that their attitudes towards him had softened. They hadn’t fought him for guardianship of Michelle, and had been his biggest support when he needed someone to help out with her. Amelia still openly called him the dirty mistress, but it was a fond designation now. Ultimately, Peter’s death allowed them to think of him as another one of Peter’s victims, not the villain of their daughter’s story. 

He hated that label, victim. Sure, it was plenty appropriate, but it felt like such a disservice to the relationship that he and Peter had. Peter had loved him, he must have. Mycroft was under no delusions that he was some kind of sex god who could have made Peter stay if he hadn’t loved him. It made him feel better to try to rationalise Peter’s choices, to explain it to himself as fear or ignorance rather than sit with the uncomfortable possibility that he had been married to a man who took some kind of sick pleasure from using his cock as a deadly weapon. 

No, it couldn’t be that, because he was so kind and gentle most of the time. He could remember every second of the morning that Peter sent Michelle, only about 2 years old at the time, toddling into their sitting room holding a sign that read Will you marry my daddy? He could feel Peter’s arms around him as they swayed around the kitchen, classical music streaming from the tinny speakers of the old radio sitting on the counter. Even in his cruellest moments, as he berated Mycroft for being so antisocial or for putting on weight, there was still something so warm about him which always convinced Mycroft that he was the one in the wrong and Peter was only harsh because he loved him. 

“You are my sun,” Peter had said at their commitment ceremony. “Next to you, I’m just the moon. If I shine at all, it’s just a reflection of you. A cheap imitation of your shine. And you do shine, my darling. I’ve been blinded by you since I first laid eyes on you. You’re the only thing I can see. For me, there is nothing else in the world. It’s just you, Mycroft. It will always be you.” 

Mycroft couldn’t accept that those words had been entirely empty. 

Some days he would wake up still teetering on the edge of a dream, convinced he could feel Peter’s beard against the back of his neck. Those moments would awake a deep longing within him. Not for Peter, but for the feeling of safety and comfort that having someone who loved him had provided. 

Greg made a small sound, pulling Mycroft out of his memories. He was so lucky, to be able to fight this disease for as long as he had, to get a chance to love this man and be loved by him, to have his daughter, to have her be healthy, to get to be a second father to Katie, who he was struggling not to think of as his own. He leaned forward, pressing his lips adoringly to Greg’s hairline. There were so many things that he had given up on after his diagnosis, but here he was, eighteen years later, in love with the man of his dreams. He had everything he could have ever dreamed of. 

He rolled onto his back, his eyelids finally growing heavy. A smile played on his lips as his eyes closed. He inhaled deeply, breathing in the smell of their bedroom, the mixture of Greg’s bargain cologne and Mycroft’s expensive shampoo and crisp linens. It smelled like home, and safety, and love. 

Only seconds before sleep overtook him, his breath caught in his lungs and his body was suddenly wracked by a series of violent coughs.